Chapter IV: "as Flies in the Ointment."

HAVING described the site of Nauvoo, and related the circumstances connected with its establishment as a gathering place of the Saints, it is necessary to return to the consideration of some events which occurred at Quincy during the sojourn of the Saints at that place.

Paul, in his day, told the Hebrews that all were not Israel that were of Israel: so all were not Saints that flocked into Quincy with the exiles from Missouri; many of them were altogether unworthy of the association of the people of God. These preyed upon the hospitality of the people of Quincy to such an extent, that The Church by action of a conference authorized Elder John Taylor, then one of the Twelve Apostles, and who afterwards became President of the Church, to write the following letter, which was printed in the Quincy _Argus_:

In consequence of so great an influx of strangers, arriving in
this place daily, owing to their late expulsion from the State
of Missouri, there must of necessity be, and we wish to state to
the citizens of Quincy and the vicinity, through the medium of
your columns, that there are many individuals among the numbers
who have already arrived, as well as among those who are now on
their way here, who never did belong to our Church, and others who
once did, but who, for various reasons, have been expelled from
our fellowship. Among these are some who have contracted habits
which are at variance with principles of moral rectitude (such
as swearing, dram-drinking, etc.,) which immoralities the Church
of Latter-day Saints is liable to be charged with, owing to our
amalgamation under our late existing circumstances. And as we as a
people do not wish to lay under any such imputation, we would also
state, that such individuals do not hold a name or a place amongst
us; that we altogether discountenance everything of the kind,
that every person once belonging to our community, contracting or
persisting in such immoral habits, have hitherto been expelled from
our society; and that such as we may hereafter be informed of, we
will hold no communion with, but will withdraw our fellowship from
them.

We wish further to state, that we feel laid under peculiar
obligations to the citizens of this place for the patriotic
feelings which have been manifested, and for the hand of liberality
and friendship which was extended to us, in our late difficulties;
and should feel sorry to see that philanthropy and benevolence
abused by the wicked and designing people, who under pretense of
poverty and distress, should try to work up the feelings of the
charitable and humane, get into their debt without any prospect
or intention of paying, and finally, perhaps, we as a people be
charged with dishonesty.

We say that we altogether disapprove of such practices, and we warn
the citizens of Quincy against such individuals who may pretend to
belong to our community.

I have given this letter _in extenso_, because it bears upon its face the evidence of the honesty of The Church, and its disposition to treat the people of Illinois, who had so nobly and kindly received its members in the days of their distress, with candor. It also tells us of a class even then in The Church, who by the vileness of their lives gave some coloring to the charges subsequently so unjustly made against the whole Church; a class who brought upon The Church reproach; an unrighteous, apostate element, which lingered with The Church for the sake of advantage--the bane of the body religious.